That Night
by Lady Devonna
Summary: Chapter 8 is the last, people! It's all over now. You'll have to click to find out if Shuichi's going to make it, Yuki's going to kill himself, or Ryuichi and the Kumagoro family are going to run off to Aregentina together.
1. Default Chapter

"Thanks for the ride, Yuki!"  
  
"It's easier than having you dash into the house wet and sobbing because I forgot," the writer grunted, next best thing to ignoring his obnoxious little lover. "If you start crying you walk."  
  
Shuichi snapped a hand over his trembling lower lip. It was pouring, dark, and windy. Besides, anyone who can turn on the waterworks so easily can also shut them off in a second, if need be.  
  
Yuki, for once, had an excuse for his crabbiness. His latest novel was six weeks late, and he wasn't sure about it anyway. Having his own real romance had made him rather tired of writing idealistic fairy tales of other- heterosexual-couples. This new book was a thriller/tragedy based largely in his own diaries and with each chapter headed by a quote from a Bad Luck song. (The latter embarrassed him deeply, but the look he envisioned on Shu- chan's adoring face made it worth it.) He was far more deeply involved with the semi-autobiographical work than anything he'd ever written, but he couldn't for the life of him predict how it'd go over with his editors or, worse, those shallow girls who crowded the bookstore the car happened to be shooting past, still crowing over his last release. On top of those worries, Mika'd been leaving mysterious hints on his answering machine, Tatsuha was popping by more frequently, and he had an overall sense of foreboding that probably linked to future attempts by family to be filial.  
  
"Yuuuuki! You're driving too fast!"  
  
"Shut up, baka." Seeing Shuichi's face fall out of the corner of his eye, Yuki couldn't help feeling a little guilty for his mood, but the last thing he felt like dealing with was a sugar-high, pink-hared pop star. And he was driving faster than the wet, slick roads and oppressive darkness deemed wise, but admitting that would just add to his present discomforts.  
  
"Slow down Yuki. Please? There was a bad accident yesterday around here."  
  
"See if I let you watch the news again."  
  
"Yukiiiiiiii."  
  
Eiri's uncertain temper snapped. "Shut up!" Bad-temperedly, he slammed on the gas and spun around a corner, warranting a squeal from Shuichi. In fact, he noted a slight skid that even made him a little nervous, but to let up now would be to admit defeat.  
  
"Yuki, Yuki, please." Shuichi was pouting again, but his fear looked real. And, when Yuki thought about it, Shuichi was always sincere, a trait he shared with no one else in the avoidant author's life. "Eiri."  
  
At his first name, even Yuki couldn't hold out. Only a gruff grunt escaped him, but he slowed to an almost too-careful speed. Shuichi beamed and leaned gently on his shoulder, and Yuki melted inside. "Knock it off, baka."  
  
"Yuuuukiiii looooooves meeeeeee," Shuichi chanted softly, which Yuki had a feeling would be really annoying really soon. "Yuuuuuuuuukiiiiiiiiiii loooooooooo-Yuki, watch out!"  
  
A car stalled and skidded in front of them. It was too late to break, so Yuki swerved to the left. He had learned to drive with no one in the passenger seat.  
  
Time seemed to slow down as the slick streets threw the car out of control, careening rapidly towards a bridge support. Shuichi's screams ringing in his ears like the horn on Judgment Day*, Yuki tried to pull Shuichi back, out of harm's way, but too late.  
  
A horrible, sickening crunch, searing pain in his right arm, and the sudden absence of sound from Shuichi all struck him simultaneously, and he blacked out.  
  
A/N: The basic premise for this story comes from a song. I'll be using it later, to torment Yuki, so I won't say what, but anyone who guesses it shall have. my commendations, I guess.  
  
*Gabriel's horn, which will supposedly sound on the last day, whatever that is, calling each soul to judgment according to his or her sins. I have no idea how much or little Judeo-Christian mythology Yuki might have picked up in New York, but whatever. Shuichi would probably be flattered by the comparison. 


	2. beginning of an end

A/N: Well, yet another short chapter for you, though not AS short. *sigh* Thanks to all who reviewed. I love reviews. I LIVE on reviews. *turns into an orange-haired version of a Shuichi-chibi, munching on a vat o' reviews* Oh, and, congratulations to jmccall93, you guessed the song and get a . *KUMAGORO BEEEEEAAAAAMMMMM*  
  
Yuki was reasonably sure he couldn't have been out more than a few seconds. The blood on his temple was still warm and hadn't had time to flow any farther. That, and what he was sure was a broken arm, seemed to be all that was wrong with him.  
  
"Yu- Yuk.i?"  
  
His brain suddenly caught up with him. "Shuichi? Shu-chan, are you alright?" It was too dark and rainy to see much, but he couldn't help noticing far more blood that could have come from his arm and forehead spattered around. Blindly, his fingers found the source amid the soft, pink locks he'd never admit he loved so much.  
  
Perhaps he'd just imagined the voice. It wouldn't strike him as odd that Shuichi would cry out for him with his last strength, little as he deserved it. But there was too much blood; Shuichi's frail little body was too still.  
  
Dizzy himself from blood loss he barely noticed, Yuki could only cling to Shuichi, even as he heard the approach of sirens and half-noticed the crowd of gawkers collected around the car. Some part of him knew he was being irrational, a part that had been weakening gradually since that night Shuichi had scrambled clumsily into his life. He whispered frantic pleas to Shuichi, to the darkness, to the gods he'd fled since childhood betrayal.  
  
The door on his side was wrenched open, revealing a cop and a paramedic. Rational Yuki forced his way to the surface again, leaving his cringing, childish half-self still holding what was left of Shuichi in spirit. "I think I'm alright. He's not."  
  
Yuki allowed himself to be eased out of the car and handed over to two more paramedics, one of whom was female and recognized him. He divided his consciousness between deterring her attentions and restraining himself from running back to Shuichi, now being loaded onto a stretcher and too, too still.  
  
Dumbly, on the way to the hospital, he sat in shock as the doctors splinted his arm and cleaned the cut on his forehead. Shuichi obviously occupied his thoughts, but they wouldn't settle. As a writer, he always worked in words, but they failed him. Random images spun through his mind. Shuichi singing in front of a thousand assembled fans but just for Yuki. Shuichi in tears over some small insensitivity, anguish dispelled by the slightest show of affection. Shuichi shouting his love from stage, more than once, Shuichi dragging his dour boyfriend through the park, Shuichi in pain, both physical and mental, out of love for Yuki.  
  
Already, Yuki's sadistic subconscious had twisted the accident until it was avoidable and entirely his fault. After they'd reached the hospital and his arm had been cast properly, he conceded to his fan and nurse, who suggested he spend the night in case of something she was very vague about. Pain and blood loss threw him immediately into a tormented sleep.  
  
~~~  
  
Yuki woke to the bustle of a general ward in the morning, something he'd never witnessed from his private room. Suffering from morning amnesia, he found it sort of educational and even amusing while the events of the previous night caught up with him. Knowing how hard it was to get answers out of anyone in the medical profession, he waited for the nurse from before.  
  
He managed to flag her down relatively quickly, and fortunately she wasn't doing anything urgent. "Hi, what's your name?"  
  
She giggled and blushed. ".Ritsuko."  
  
Since stardom had descended on his unwilling blond head, Yuki had learned to keep a few of whatever was most recently his selling point on his person. A copy of his latest, A Girl in Tokyo (the uninspired title of which still annoyed him*), still rested in his pocket, and he was seldom without a pen. Making a professional show of it, he signed the book to Ritsuko in his best, most unnecessarily flowery handwriting.  
  
While she blushed and giggled some more over the gift, Yuki assessed the situation. She was probably too old to take much interest in even the most popular boybands, so wouldn't have necessarily recognized Shuichi, unless from a commercial. "The man who was in the car with me, what's his condition?" Yuki didn't dare to ask if he was alright.  
  
Ritsuko looked apologetic. "He's in a coma, Yuki-san. A deep one. He's not on my floor, but my friend Sumi's seen him. If you feel well enough to get up, I could hand you over to her." Yuki had a feeling she'd promised this friend to get her a glimpse of "Yuki-san."  
  
He suavely managed to survive both the nurses over the course of about fifteen minutes, finally getting Sumi to show him to Shuichi. Yuki was surprised, and a little annoyed, to find Hiro, Suguru, K, and Ryuichi already clustered around the bed. He managed a small, sad smile for the latter at the sight of Kumagoro propped against Shuichi's shoulder. From even a slight acquaintance, Yuki recognized the ultimate sacrifice from the half-insane singer.  
  
Yuki didn't speak, elbowing a place between the standing members of Bad Luck with his good arm. He was sure he felt accusing stares from the others. It couldn't be unknown that he was driving the car.  
  
A long, pregnant silence was broken by Ryuichi. "Kuma-chan says Shu-kun'll be fine."  
  
While K, Hiro, and Suguru muttered grudging, frustrated replies, Yuki turned his gaze to the pink bunny he suddenly had to put his faith in, then to Shuichi's bandaged face. He couldn't help feeling he was about to loose the one thing that had mattered to him in his adult life.  
  
* Translation: The author of this fanfic was feeling so incredibly uninspired she managed to P.O. her (stolen) characters. 


	3. it can't be true

A/N: *looks up from gobbling generous reviews* I LOVE YOU ALL!!! *bows, with big, gooey, penitential eyes* Sorry for not updating. I've been really busy, a little uninspired, and sort of vaguely grounded. ...Nothing further. Read my unworthy tribute. Or I'll eat you. Oh, and, like this, updates may not come so quickly. I have school and useless crap like that interfering with my fluffy yaoi fantasies.  
  
After a while, rational Yuki won out. Hiro's whining, K's raving, and Suguru's sulking all threatened to drive him utterly and irrevocably insane. Oddly enough, he found Ryuichi a comfort. As usual, the last one to catch on to the obvious, he'd never really noticed the resemblance that had caught Tatsua's eye so easily.  
  
Deciding there was nothing to be accomplished here, he left, vowing to return as often as he could. Something struck him as right out of one of his own stupid books about waiting patiently with a comatose lover, who might... never... awaken... Ignoring stares on the bus, he wiped tears from his eyes, almost surprised to find them there.  
  
He was likewise surprised to find himself at home, with almost no memory of the half-hour trip. Vaguely, he wished for his car (now in a garage), but doubted he'd ever be able to get behind a wheel again.  
  
Lighting a cigarette, he sank into the chair in front of his trusty laptop. He was pretty close to the end of his still unnamed masterpiece, and thought a nice all-nighter might take his mind off... everything.  
  
The story was veiled just enough so as not to tip off the general public, or at least his editors, to the real nature of the work. It centered around self-star-crossed lovers Shunichi, a bleached-blond piano prodigy, and Yutaka, a struggling, reclusive poet. He'd been wanting so, so badly to add a happy ending, but...  
  
Yuki's fingers flew across the keyboard to their own rhythm, quickly adapting to one useless arm, largely independent of Yuki himself.  
The face that hides sadness is lead astray.  
Why the trembling?  
The pleasure principal is to laugh.  
  
23 Yutaka tremblingly lit a cigarette and waited for the nicotine buzz he so desperately needed. The initial daze of the news had worn off, and he desperately fought reality setting in. He knew he'd soon be hearing from various well-wishers, and possibly even the news. Even he could see the human-interest story in the tragic demise of a young and promising musician.  
  
Even thinking the words "tragic demise" literally knocked him off his chair. Feeling drunk, despite being sober for at least four weeks, he hauled himself back into his chair. The only thing clear in his head was that phone call, that damn, innocuous ring that had shattered the fragile, beautiful world he'd been stupid enough to believe would last.  
  
"Shun...chan..." Tears pricked the back of his eyes, that singular yet familiar sensation he'd almost forgotten, when  
  
"YUKI, OPEN THIS DAMN DOOR!"  
  
The real Yuki fell off his chair, having almost reached the euphoric state where even the blond locks in his eyes turned the brown-red he'd written for Yutaka. "...Mika?"  
  
"Open the door, little brother..." She was sounding sweet the way she only did when fantastically outraged.  
  
Rather confused, Yuki saved, snapped down the laptop (the last thing he needed was her commentary), and opened the door. "Wha...?"  
  
"What's going on, where have you been, why aren't you answering the phone, where's your pesky boytoy, what happened to your arm, and WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON?!"  
  
As the torrent of Mika-ness sunk in, Yuki gradually realized it was pitch black outside. He was sure he'd only come in about twenty minutes ago. He blinked a few times. "...Wha?"  
  
She slapped him. "I assume you didn't hear the phone."  
  
"Uh... no."  
  
"Or me knocking for the last half-hour?"  
  
"No..."  
  
"Where's Shuichi?"  
  
"Uh..." Feeling the tears he'd just described for Yutaka, and foreseeing terrible repercussions, he slammed the door in Mika's face and slumped to the floor just in front of it, sobbing uncontrollably. 


	4. The Pain of it all

A/N: I'm so happy! I just read Gravitation number 4! And Tokyopop rules for bringing it out in the US. *does the I'm-finally-reading-the-manga-behind- the-ultimate-yaoi-fluff-anime dance* Reviews make me happy too, my friends! Though I've been getting lots of nice reviews on this story. And I think I'm gonna illustrate it, too. But later. In the meantime, my chapters are getting shorter and shorter, but more frequent. Having fun at the edge of your seats, my friends?  
  
Yuki popped a couple of fairly potent painkillers, both for his arm and conscience, and shut off the computer. Having left Yutaka sobbing at Shunichi's bedside somewhere in the depths of his hard drive, and rather envying his protagonist's freedom of emotion, Yuki lowered himself into bed, careful of the bad arm. It felt so empty. Which didn't make any sense, since Shuichi'd been banned from the bedroom for a week.  
  
"God... I'm really a complete bastard, aren't I?" Yuki was slightly taken aback, not even realizing he'd spoken aloud (and eliciting a smug eyebrow from Mika, who'd picked the lock and set herself up in the abandoned living room for easy ambush). He'd known for most of his life he wasn't a likeable character, as a general rule, but there'd been a certain amount of wry satisfaction in the knowledge. Being a bastard kept people away from him. Except Shuichi, of course, but even as he'd felt the resolute façade of his stoic existence collapsing around him, it hadn't occurred to him that the mask he'd forgotten wasn't his face might be due to come off.  
  
That meant he wouldn't even have a last night with his Shu-chan to look back on. He'd been working hard and barely noticed Shuichi coming home the night before the accident. They ate their instant ramen at opposite ends of the house, and Shuichi's good night hug/last ditch attempt to win his way back into the bed had been met only with a grunt and some second-hand smoke. Yuki couldn't even remember why he'd banished Shuichi to the sofa.  
  
He tried to remember something, anything, that might mean he wasn't quite that bad. Something nice he'd done for his little lover, or anybody. Defending Shuichi from ASK? ...That's right. A random act of kindness indeed, mauling a moderately innocent bystander to teach his bandmate a lesson for having your boyfriend gangbanged after the fact.  
  
Deciding he wouldn't escape being a bastard by any definition, Yuki let his mind wander. Over the course of that sleepless, miserable night, he reworked a thousand ways the accident could have gone.  
  
The first thing he envisioned, of course, was a simple swerve to the right, where it was Yuki now lying comatose, causing nothing but five-minute fits to legions of girls who'd very soon find someone new to obsess over. That simple answer was ruined by the image of Shuichi, spilling a fountain of tears into Yuki's hair, falling into deep depression, and six months later drowning himself half-by accident while trying to collect his thoughts near a lake. There were times an author's imagination was a curse.  
  
Yuki readily condemned himself for selfishness at being glad this wasn't the case, not consciously recognizing what might be a hint he wasn't a complete bastard. He knew Shuichi would rather loose his life than his Yuki.  
  
In the second version, Yuki slammed desperately on the breaks, and the car screamed to a halt, crushing the fender and hood but leaving both passengers protected behind the airbags. Shuichi came away unscathed, though Yuki, taller, knocked his head a little roughly. Shuichi squealed and clung to his arm, though half-buried in the airbags. Yuki took him home on the bus, calmed him down, and set him gently into bed with a cup of tea and a massage. The fantasy lasted until a squeak from the floor jarred him back awake and into actuality.  
  
As his slightly drugged mind slipped further towards much-needed sleep, the scenarios became more elaborate. Instead of snapping at Shuichi on the way home, he slowed down, stopped for sushi, and took a route that didn't involve slick roads or stalled cars. Strange for an imagination like his, that was rejected outright.  
  
~~~  
  
Yutaka stared sullenly into space, avoiding Shunichi's blank face. Whatever the doctors might say, he knew there was no soul left in his lover's pathetic corpse. "Appreciable hope of recovery" was a terrible cover up anyway.  
  
Yuki paced restlessly through the house. There were times, probably due in a large part to steadily increasing doses of industrial-strength painkillers and binge drinking, when the line blurred between himself and Yutaka. He was often surprised to find blond hair falling in his eyes, and sometimes even forgot for a moment whether it was Shun- or Shu-chan that was causing him such agony.  
  
It was three days since the accident. He hadn't changed or shaved in the time, and was re-developing a habit that had sprung up when he was sixteen of humming nervously and looking over his shoulder a lot. The coffee pot was always going, though he mixed the stuff with beer so freely exactly what effect either beverage had was up for dispute. He'd also stained or burned holes in the rugs and furniture, careless with cigarettes and food alike.  
  
Absentmindedly, over his half-cooked instant ramen and three or four Budweisers,* he switched on the radio.  
  
Something frightening attracts my gaze  
  
An irritating desire spit out by the wanton wind In a widening crack on the road The lights of signals melt Leaving only a scar Before that dozing noise erases tomorrow My footsteps echo as I pursue my ambition. I will not stop for anything Any unsatisfying emotion I will just ignore And move beyond Shivering, shyly, I took aim For the gap in my world Following it I arrived at a new place I want new world. My guilty feelings combine to form The tears that carve into the main streets Distorting the sound of my footsteps even now I will not stop for anything  
  
Any unsatisfying emotion I will just ignore  
  
And move beyond Shivering, shyly, I took aim For the gap in my world Following it I arrived at a new place I want new world  
  
Yuki was surprised to hear his own voice (a rather off-key tenor) stumbling along brokenly with Shuichi's. His throat caught every few notes. Feeling a sort of vague sympathy for his many characters, and sensing Yutaka rising to the surface again, he stumbled to the bathroom, clutching the half a can of beer he had left.  
  
Slurring badly, Yuki let his one gift, elocution, take over. "I was never strong like him. I was never the kind of person with any capacity for pain." Without hesitation, he tipped half a bottle of his prescription down his throat, washing it down with what remained of the beer.  
  
*I swear, he's drinking Bud at at least one point in the anime. 


	5. Failure

A/N: I'd like everybody to know I'm turning into an angst whore. And it is of no importance I just now invented the designation for myself. Thanks for the reviews, anyway! I love all my fans! *blows kisses*  
  
Yuki woke slowly, reluctantly, in his own bed, with a half-melted bag of ice on his forehead. His mouth tasted, unsurprisingly, like too much medicine and old beer. He was pretty sure he should be dead, but it would be nice irony if he'd managed to fuck up even suicide.  
  
He could see where the cosmos might get a kick out of thwarting him, but that left the question of how he'd gotten into bed from collapsed against the bathtub, which bruised ribs testified he hadn't imagined. He started to sit up, felt short of breath and dizzy, and dropped straight back onto the pillow.  
  
Had he managed to crawl back on his own, somehow? That wouldn't explain being tucked in like a kid who had nightmares. That was something Shuichi would do.  
  
Blearily, Yuki opened his eyes again and they fell on a picture of Shuichi on his bedside table. The 8x10 had been living in his desk drawer as long as he'd had it, one of many places Shuichi was too cowed to look. Why, exactly, that Yuki didn't want Shuichi to know he had it, wasn't clear to him. He'd moved it into the bedroom the second he got home.  
  
Yuki managed to sit up. He stared blearily at the glossy, feeling his throat catch and eyes start to burn again as those intoxicating eyes smiled out at him, brimming with life. Almost unconsciously, he pressed the picture to his heart and allowed a few tears to fall.  
  
After a few minutes, He set the picture down and got out of bed. He still felt dazed, but only mildly. With no idea what he might find, he eased the door open.  
  
Ryuichi was lying on the couch. Or, rather, in a strange position even the author had no word for. He was on his back, facing the wall, with both (bare) feet up on the top of the sofa, his head hanging off the front. He was chanting "no da" over and over to the tune of "Shining Collection" and making a chain of multicolored paperclips Shuichi had bought Yuki in an attempt to brighten up his desk. A stuffed rabbit that looked exactly like Kumagoro except for being blue balanced on his upturned toes.  
  
Yuki probably should have been more surprised than he was. "Uh... How did you get in here?"  
  
Ryuichi appeared to teleport, suddenly straight in front of Yuki. "Gooooooood morning!" As an afterthought, he shoved the bunny under Yuki's nose. "Say hiiiiiiii to Kohana!"  
  
"Hi...iiii." Wait, had he just voluntarily greeted a blue scrap of stuffed plush?  
  
"She's Kuma-chan's little sister," Ryuichi said by way of introduction, suddenly producing a cup of coffee from the strange dimension that followed him around, where the laws of physics didn't exist. "Kuma-chan said someone should keep an eye on you. But he has to watch Shu-kun and Koh-chan needs to make sure I remember to look both ways and eat a good breakfast—" He stopped talking for about three minutes to hug the bunny "—so Ki-chan's gonna take care of you!" Yuki found himself holding a yellow version of Kuma- and Koh-chan which had apparently materialized from the reorganization of the oxygen and cigarette-smoke atoms floating around,. "She's their little cousin. I gotta go meet Pico-Pico Noriko-chan for breakfast. Byyyyyyyyeeeeeeee, Yuuuuuukiiiiiiii!" He scampered out the door, back to chanting.  
  
Yuki stared after him blankly, and decided not to make any attempt to think over whatever the hell had just happened. He deposited the rabbit on the table and drained the coffee. It was very strong, slightly sweetened with the only real sugar in the house, just slightly tempered by milk—not cream, and sprinkled with cinnamon. Shuichi was the only one who knew precisely how Yuki liked his coffee, but in the course of the last five minutes, enough had happened so Yuki didn't really notice.  
  
He'd been brooding over the coffee for an indeterminate amount of time, half considering trying the pills again or maybe trying something less risky (seppuku was always a possibility), when there was a frenzied knock. "Uh... Yeah?"  
  
Mika threw the door open. "Wait, you look fine! ...For you."  
  
Yuki took a calm sip of coffee. Whatever might be going on, with the exception of that initial fluke, he could always annoy his sister. "Uh, do you have to sound so disappointed?"  
  
"Noriko just called and told me Ryuichi found you unconscious, with most of bottle of pills down your throat."  
  
"Hey, that time you didn't sound disappointed."  
  
"Shut up, Eiri. Now, Did Sakuma-san tie his bandanna too tight, or should I get you back to the shrink?"  
  
"If you'll excuse me, I have to feed the cat."  
  
"You don't have a cat."  
  
"Well, I'm going to get one."  
  
She smacked him, provoking the hangover that had been driven under by the pills. "Eiri, did you or did you not try to kill yourself?"  
  
"You just drove me to it. See you on the pavement." He opened the window and slung a leg over the sill.  
  
"I AM NOT THAT EASILY MANIPULABLE!"  
  
"Gee, I can see the headlines now. 'Promising young author driven to suicide by his interfering sibling.' "  
  
"Eiri..."  
  
"Want me to do it?" He scooched further out the window. Of course, it was only a two-story drop, but Mika didn't think too well under stress.  
  
"EIRI!"  
  
He seriously considered it, just to spite her. That he had nothing real to spite her about didn't bother him. He needed a scapegoat. "If you don't want me to do it, go away."  
  
"Eiri..." Her voice was soft and pleading. "You're scaring me. Come on back with me. You can stay at our house. Tohma's been worried about you since we heard what happened to Shuichi."  
  
Yuki closed his eyes and started muttering. "Yutaka sighed heavily. Having Michi around might well be the straw that broke the camel's back. What the hell does she think she can do? he wondered vaguely. He glanced at the clock, wanting nothing more than to get away from his little sister and see Shunichi. Hospital visiting hours would be over soon. And Shunichi's parents had been saying they didn't want him to suffer. If life support was to be cut, it was probably all for the better, but he couldn't let Shun- chan go without saying an unheard goodbye."  
  
"Eiri?"  
  
"What? I'm working." He swung back into the room and headed into his study without a glance in her direction, grabbing Ki-chan on the way and locking the door with a decisive click.  
  
A/N: If anyone's wondering, it's not clear to me either whether Ryuichi really had any idea what was going on. In fact, he's acting like me (especially the paperclip thing... not like my room is full of paperclip chains or anything). Aside from that, how does everyone like the Kumagoro family? Green next, or pruple? 


	6. Yori's questionable gift

A/N: Yuki going a little insane? Where'd you get that idea? Oh, and I just realized I didn't put a disclaimer here anywhere. No, I don't own Gravitation. *sob* Now, for some Wudbeiser at Zenny's. Oh, and I did an illustration! Yay total lack or artistic ability! Go look at it, please? Ge-chan wants you too! (Ge-chan is my stuffed polar bear that serves essentially the same purpose as Kuma-chan) P.S. Ki-chan's real name is Kichi. If anyone wondered. Which I doubt.  
  
Hiroshi, Shunichi's cousin and best friend, was pacing around the bed when Yutaka arrived. He looked up at the man only he consented to recognize as his long-time partner's lover. "They're going to take him off. They're going to cut the oxygen, DAMMIT!" A feverish light bloomed in his eyes. "Don't let them! Tell them! You've got more right to him than they do!"  
  
Yutaka sighed. He wanted to tell Hiroshi he'd agreed, but desisted partly because he was afraid of the powerful young man but mostly because he didn't know if he had. It hurt him to look into the blank, dead-alive face once so bright with vitality.  
  
Yuki raised a derisive eyebrow at the page and stood. He hadn't been happy with his writing the last two days. Not because it wasn't happy; that was one thing he could stand. It was just that he couldn't seem to close the story. Yutaka had been hovering around waiting for Shunichi to die too long. His self-abusive refusal to give up hope seemed to be out of Yuki's control.  
  
He decided to give himself a break from writing. Sometimes that would solve a block. On a sudden whim, Yuki grabbed his wallet, three packs of cigarettes, and a raincoat and hopped a bus to Yutsuko Nuclear Facilities. He rang the rusty buzzer on the building that looked mostly lead (and might well have been). In reply to the pleasant, tired female voice on the other end, he said, "I'm Uesugi Eiri, and I'm looking for Uesugi Yori. She's my cousin."  
  
"Just a second, I'll page her." Yuki had a vague sense he was the first thing that had happened in all the receptionist's day.  
  
Yori was only his second cousin thrice removed or something like that. She'd been disowned by his father, generally accepted as head of the family however extended, for her refusal to get married, her avid pursuit of a graduate-school education, and her pointedly non-traditional outlook. Yuki sought her out now because her particular field had landed her diagnosed with cancer three times. In fact, she'd once been legally dead. As it stood, she was now breastless, down half a pancreas, and almost completely bald. She also had the only viable outlook on life and death out of anyone he knew.  
  
He waited about five minutes before she stepped out. She snapped out an umbrella to shield the elaborate silk scarf wound around her head more than to keep herself dry. The lab coat under her arm made her look professional despite the jeans and T-shirt she was wearing. "Well, Eiri-kun, to what do I owe the pleasure?"  
  
"I need an excuse to visit my own cousin?"  
  
"If you haven't seen her in about four years, might wanna call first. You're lucky it's my lunch." She sounded like she wanted to kill him, but looked pleasant enough and started walking with him back to the bus stop. Quite in step with everything he knew about Yori. "Your Dad still hate me?"  
  
"With a passion."  
  
"Next you run in to him, tell him I'm a lesbian now. Figured since I had no more female reproductive organs I might as well drop the whole concept."  
  
"He'll be pleased. ...Last I saw you you still had a uterus and ovaries."  
  
"I've got one ovary, but the rest was all full of nasty, corrosive, cancerous shit. I have it all preserved in salt water and formaldehyde at home, if you're interested." She paid her fare and managed to find two seats on the extremely crowded bus. "So, why did you come looking for me?"  
  
"Erm..."  
  
"It has absolutely nothing to do with the dead singing brat that that writer who looks remarkably like you was supposed to be sleeping with?"  
  
"I suddenly remember why I haven't talked to you in four years." He leaned back on the seat. "How did you do that?"  
  
"I hear from Tatsuha once in a while, if you really want to spoil the illusion of clairvoyance." She looked at him crookedly. "And I can almost see your logic in talking to me. What if you buy me lunch?"  
  
"Uh, sure." They were silent until they'd settled into a booth. "I don't really know what I want to talk about... And I can't believe I'm talking like this. I sound like..."  
  
"You sound like one of your own novels," Yori offered around a cup of tea.  
  
"You read them?"  
  
"One, and I've never digested quite such tripe. Damn your sister for coercing me so." She seemed to be thinking about something. "Is he dead? I mean, certified, cremated, mourned by many?"  
  
"No... He's in a coma."  
  
"You know, I think those books are infecting your life." She paused. "Well, he's probably been hanging around at that annoying light with all the Latin chanting coming out of it—And don't laugh, that's what I saw—for a while now, but he may be back. Don't loose what hope you might have."  
  
"I want to." She cocked her head at him like a quizzical dog, albeit a dog wearing green and blue silk dragons around her head. "I know he won't recover. I want this to be over, to get around this stupid hope so..."  
  
"So you can go ahead and shoot yourself." Yuki nodded, slumping forward and resting his chin in his hands. "Well, I'll pull the trigger for you if you're sure that's what you want."  
  
He stared at her, half scared, half grateful. "...Really?"  
  
"But, are you sure that's what you want?"  
  
"Uh..." He noticed she had the most obnoxious smug expression while he was tumultuously pondering. It reminded him of Tatsuha. Which meant it was probably just the expression people complained about on him. "No. When he's dead, yes, but while there's any chance at all..."  
  
"That's what I thought." Yori finished off her tea. "Well, my dear Eiri, hope makes crazy fools of us all, springs ever eternal, and various other quotes I can't seem to call to mind. I hope you get your little cutie back. From the posters and such I've seen, you could do much worse. And, I have to say, I think you will. Call it a hunch." She stood to go, leaving her share of the bill.  
  
Yuki waved after her languidly, feeling he'd benefited somehow but rather disappointed. Suddenly, she turned back around. "Oh, Eiri?"  
  
"Yeah?"  
  
"I assume you heard through the filial grapevine that my hair had been zapped by too much radioactivity, and the follicles are just dead, and there was really no reason to think about it, because the whole thing was a done deal?"  
  
"Er, yeah..." He was completely lost.  
  
"Actually, I'm just so used to this veil I think I enjoy it." She pulled off the silken scarf, and thick, shining raven hair tumbled to her waist. "Bye, favorite little cousin."  
  
Yuki stared after her for a long time before he went home.  
  
A/N: Oh, I was so close! I almost managed to write a fanfic without introducing my own characters for my convenience! Dammit, I can never work completely with someone else's world. I just couldn't think of anyone else Yuki could talk to. Mika and Tohma would flip out if he said anything along these lines, and Tatsuha would either be freaked out or laugh it off. It was either Yori or a Shakespearean soliloquy. I don't know if she'll enter the story again or just stay a very odd plot device. Does anyone like her? Oh, and the hair thing obviously had some symbolism, but if Yuki understood it, I didn't. 


	7. Family Matters

A/N: Okay, the link to my illustration didn't show up at all last time. Just because I'm a review whore, I'll post it here again in hopes it's visible. Gotta love the angsty Yuki. Well, part of this chapter was sort of requested... Specifically, by KrissKittie, who has been a nicely faithful, extensive reviewer. Oh, well, I'm letting reviews drive a lot of what happens in this story. So, if you feel like manipulating the little universe herein, drop a line.  
  
"Shunichi... Shunichi, please, please wake up... Wake up... Wake up..." Yutaka slumped, sobbing, at the side of the bed. He didn't want Shunichi unplugged after all; he didn't care if he was selfishly prolonging the little vegetable's suffering; he just wanted his Shun-chan. Hiroshi had stormed off to scream at Shun's parents, leaving him alone. Tremblingly, he lifted Shunichi's cold fingers to his lips, whispered his goodbye in four different languages- none of them Japanese- and slowly backed out of the room. His thoughts lingered briefly on one last dream of his lover, then shot to the switchblade knife in his coat pocket.  
  
Some odd compassion drove him to park away from any schools or parks, in the red-light district of town. No one else needed a nasty shock out of this. He was struck by a sweet, highly poetic image of a baptism of blood for the holy ground that had held a vibrant, laughing Shunichi weeks before. Unable to help himself, he scrawled a few lines of what might have turned into his best poem on the notepad he kept on the dashboard for just such occasions.  
  
He tested the knife on his finger. Blood spilled onto his lap, a lot for such a small wound. He judged the amount of liquid about even with the tears he'd shed in the first minute after hearing about Shun-chan.  
  
About what was entirely his fault.  
  
About how Shunichi had fought with his parents over is decision to move in with his MALE lover, how his last words to his family had been a shrill "I hate you!" About how he'd blindly rushed into the pitch black, sleety night, straight in front of a delivery truck. That happened to carry a shipment of Yutaka's latest poetry collection.  
  
"Damn irony..." Well, he was about to add some of his own. He'd taken one of the strings from Shunichi's piano and made a noose of it. It would probably break, and he was really relying on the slit veins to do the job, but the symbolism screamed. They'd send each other to the afterlife, and gods help anyone who tried to interfere with their happiness then.  
  
AND THEN SUDDENLY EIRI TURNED AROUND, DECIDED HE WAS BEING SILLY, AND WENT BACK TO LIVING.  
  
AND THEN HE SLUGGED HIS DAMN SISTER AND ASKED HOW SHE GOT INTO HIS HOUSE AND WHY SHE TYPES IN ALL CAPS OVER PEOPLE'S SHOULDERS.  
  
Mika glared at him. "Eiri..."  
  
"Well, you know my name, I'll give you that." He swung around in his chair. "Why does everybody seem to think they can break into my house?"  
  
"You haven't changed your locks for a while, for one thing." She dragged Shuichi's chair out of the corner, and pointedly declined to notice when Yuki bristled. "Wading through the beer cans and cigarette butts was harder than the breaking and entering."  
  
"I should add alligators." He dropped his cigarette in the BAD LUCK ashtray next to his glass of combined coffee and beer. "Do you want something?"  
  
She grabbed his hand in a vice grip. "It's not my wants. It's what you'll discover as needful to your health and sanity in a moment."  
  
Yuki couldn't resist. "...Sounds kinky."  
  
She managed to ignore him. "You're coming with me, right now. We're going back to my house, where Tohma and Tatsuha are waiting, and we're going to sort you out." When Yuki opened his mouth for a witty retort, she dragged him to his feet and out the door.  
  
Yuki, feeling distinctly eight years old, allowed himself to be marched out to Mika's car. "Do you even have a job besides playing Tohma's gopher?" She didn't answer, so he sulked petulantly the whole way to their apartment. His instincts were to get out of this, and quickly, but Mika was rather too persistent for his taste.  
  
Yuki still wasn't sure how he'd ended up in such a predicament when he and Mika entered her dining room, where Tohma was looking pristine and Tatsuha bored. He'd sort of half hoped Yori might be around, but she was probably busy zapping some innocent scrap of matter with beams of solid energy. Unable to squelch his basic stupidity, he ventured a weak one-liner. "Is this party for me?"  
  
"Sit down, Eiri." Tohma's voice betrayed a slight particle of the worry his face never would have.  
  
"I like standing." He slumped against the doorframe, trying to look like the cover illustration on the paperback release of Night With Mamoru, one of his worst insults to literature yet.  
  
"Good, more strawberry shortcake for me." Tatsuha managed to withstand the Mika Death Glare™ that usually knocked Yuki off his feet. Yuki had a sense it would prove he was completely fucked up if he refused his favorite food, thus demonstrating just how lost he was in thinking there was anyone in the room who didn't know it.  
  
"Eiri, we need to talk."  
  
Yuki spoke around a mouthful of cake. "Okay, most truly beloved of brother- in-laws, we are now talking."  
  
"Eiri!" Mika looked a little murderous. Nothing new on that end.  
  
Tohma had always been rather better at putting up with Yuki's... Yukiness. "What, exactly, have you been doing with yourself the last two weeks?"  
  
Two weeks? Yuki didn't find it all that surprising that he'd missed a few days. Probably drunk. "Writing, mostly. This novel's going longer than I thought it would."  
  
"Oh, okay then." Tatsuha stood and stretched luxuriously. "Bye everybody, I—"A look from Mika sat him down again, where he sulked.  
  
Two half-forgotten weeks before, Yuki surely would have noticed the uncharacteristic tenseness to Tohma's posture, that his knuckles and fingertips were white from gripping the table as an inconspicuous lifeline. "Is that all?"  
  
"I saw Yori a few days ago." He forgot to appreciate his luck in that his most verifiable alibi wouldn't rat him out. He'd never get rid of his interfering family if his conversation with Yori came out. "And I've visited Shuichi a lot." One commonly had to force Tohma to the point.  
  
"Yes, about that..." Tohma set his coffee down. "Has he improved any?"  
  
"No." Yuki had been doing a fairly good job of not thinking about it except through Yutaka, but if this conversation continued he had a distinct sense he'd start crying. Dammit, not with Tohma here...  
  
Mika spoke up imperially. "I found time to have a word with his doctor. There's relatively no chance for recovery at this point. In fact, his vitals have been falling off a little. The tabloids are going mad." Yuki hadn't known any of that, not having been able to bring himself to see Shuichi in... well, some undetermined while.  
  
"Ah. Well, in that case..." Tohma's lips tightened and his gaze lowered. Even Yuki spotted the total insincerity in his apparent remorse. "Perhaps it's time to move on?"  
  
Yuki decided he hadn't heard that.  
  
Unaware that he hadn't spoken, therefore giving Yuki no reason to tear his throat out, Tohma continued. "I've made it no secret that I never approved of your little romance. You may have just been presented a convenient way out."  
  
"You... You godamned fucking bastard!" Before Yuki knew what he was doing—though he probably wouldn't have made a different decision had he thought about it—he slugged Tohma across the jaw. Yuki's weeks living on painkillers, beer, and a few odd cups of undercooked instant ramen probably saved Tohma's life. As it was, his chair fell over backwards and he knocked into the wall only because it happened to be directly behind him, with not much more than a few bruises to worry about.  
  
It probably would have been much worse if Tatsuha hadn't grabbed his wrists before Mika got between him and Tohma. He wouldn't have objected to mutilating his sister to get at her damned husband, but his sibling's combined efforts forced him into a chair, while Tohma stood back up, shaky but relatively unscathed.  
  
Yuki managed to keep himself from strangling the bastard only by screaming. "What the hell would you know about it? You fucking, goddamned, jealous piece of worthless shit!"  
  
"Yuki! Settle down!" Mika slapped him to reinforce the message. "Hear him out."  
  
While Yuki seethed, muttering venomously, Tohma straightened himself out and managed to act like nothing had happened. "Eiri, I am only suggesting that you move on. It's, what, only about a year since you met Shuichi? There's nothing to stop you from readapting. In fact, you might use the opportunity to reassess your life in general. A reasonable period of mourning is understandable, as I can see there was some attachment. However, subjecting those who care about you to the worry you have been— Where are you going?"  
  
Yuki stuck his head back through the doorframe for a second. "To shoot myself. I think it'll work better than an overdose, as long as I remember to lock my door."  
  
Even Tohma couldn't wax stoic. "Eh... Eiri, you don't mean that..."  
  
"Don't I?" Yuki stepped back into the room. "Listen, you pompous, self- righteous, self-serving ass, you don't know what you're talking about. I died when I was sixteen. Nothing you ever did changed that. Shuichi brought me back to life, and I don't have any reason to hold on to it without him. Understood? As for 'subjecting those who care about me' to worry... Bullshit, bullshit and you know it. You need people to need you; you thrive on adoration, gratitude, and outright homage. Tatsuha doesn't care about me any more than any of his drinking buddies, cheap fucks, or free meals. My father hates me. Mika likes being in control of things. I sign my editor's paychecks, and my fangirls wouldn't read the tripe I give them if the author was fifty, fat, and wore glasses. Shuichi was the only one who ever really cared about me, just me and unto myself. Nobody else is really going to be hurt. And that's the end of it."  
  
As if he'd just delivered some casually cheerful announcement of a vacation, he waved and stepped out of the room, then broke into a dead run. He could hear all three of them calling after him frantically—and Tatsuha only sounded frantic when he sensed he wasn't going to get laid or win his hand at poker—as soon as the initial shock wore off. If Tohma had his way, Yuki realized, he'd see his brother-in-law locked up after a delivery like that.  
  
Yuki had lost the presence of mind to take any preventative measures. He simply headed home. In very short order, Yutaka was dead.  
  
A/N: One last beg that you look at my picture. As my friend put it, "Damn, that actually looks like him!" Well, anyway, end of pimping my artwork. On another note, can anyone really say, in their heart of hearts, that they didn't EVER want to see Seguichi Tohma slugged in the jaw? I thought so. Flame me if you feel obligated, but I needed that out of my system. 


	8. Make me shining, fragments of my scatter...

A/N: Well, okay, the link to my illustration persisted in NOT showing up. If you absolutely have no life, implied by the fact that you're reading this, do me a favor. Go to deviantART, then to my user (name: TotalEclipseoftheSun). The picture is called Just One More Peaceful Day. Anyway, yo, I love all you guys and Yuki has to angst now, so no more rambling introduction.  
  
Yuki slumped over his computer, staring at the screen. Yutaka had died seven times in three days. He just kept waking up. Or being rescued. And then a few pages would be deleted and it would all start again. It was just getting repetitive. Quite aside from feeble, perverted hope warring with ingrained cynicism festering together to a discordant tune of toxic madness, Yuki couldn't stand this direction from a purely literary point of view.  
  
"Whew! Kuma-chan, open a window! It's smokey in here!"  
  
Yuki was surprised only because he HAD changed the locks. "Who's there and what do you want?"  
  
"Oh, there you are!" Ryuichi spun into the room, leaping acrobatically over the overflowing wastebasket, calling back over his shoulder. "Never mind, Kuma-chan!"  
  
"And what can I do for the prima ballerina?"  
  
Ryuichi did a tentative pirouette. "Hmm, you think I could? Wow?" He spent a moment looking starry-eyed into the distance. "Okay, come on."  
  
"Come on?" Yuki had time to blink a few times before he, a pink bunny, and Ryuichi in a wardrobe pillaged from the artist formerly known as Prince were standing in his driveway. "I'll drive, okay?"  
  
"What?"  
  
"Okay, great!" Yuki never knew how he got into a pink Cadillac half smothered in rainbow-spattered bumper stickers, but there he was. Interesting, really. He wished he had it in him to care.  
  
"Yeah, Noriko-chan never lets me drive. Just because I got my license revoked the one time. And the other time. And the time other than that..." Ryuichi floored it around the inside of a crowded intersection, blowing kisses at the six or eight people who flipped him off. "Can I put on the radio?" Yuki didn't answer. "Okay, thanks!" He tuned it to the Shining Collection, miraculously on the first station he found.  
  
"Are you completely immune to the laws of probability?" Yuki asked conversationally.  
  
"Kumagoro beeeeeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaaaaam!"  
  
"Gotcha. ...Where are we going?"  
  
"Rams eat oats and does eat oats and little lambs eat ivy... Oh, did you say something, Eiri-kun?"  
  
"I wonder when I was last called Eiri-kun..."  
  
"Wow, what a coincidence!"  
  
"No, that's not what I said, that's- Never mind. Where are we going?"  
  
Ryuichi consulted a printout map on his lap. "This way, and then that way, and then that other way for a while, and then... there!" At the convenient red light, he held up the map for Yuki.  
  
"...The hospital. Do I have to hold your hand while you get your shots?"  
  
"Would you? Oh, wait a minute... Yori-san said to make you come visit come hell. Or high water..." He scanned the road, apparently searching for demonic flames and floods. "She looks a lot like you."  
  
Yuki decided to bypass investigating Yori's acquaintance with Ryuichi. "Did she go blonde?"  
  
"Did she? No... Uh-uh. Same look as you and Tatsuha, though." He started humming and eventually broke into song. "Mushrooms, mushrooms, can't be beat. Mushrooms, mushrooms, on my feet. Mushrooms, mushrooms, they're so good, mushrooms, mushrooms, like they should. Mushrooms, mushrooms, mushrooms... Better leave that one for my solo album. Tohma'd never play it. Oh, mushrooms, mushrooms, mushrooms..." Repeating the single verse, he continued the drive to the hospital more attentive to Kumagoro than Yuki.  
  
Even assuming Yori was being a royal asshole and forcing him to confront all he feared and hated, therefore coming to grips with himself and his life whatever it was to be, Yuki was glad to get out of that car. And the mushrooms.  
  
In a way, he did want to see Shuichi. Hiro had managed to catch him at a weak moment of phone answering to drop the expected bombshell that Shuichi's family had decided to pull the plug that night. For once, Yuki was going to be the tragic hero instead of write him, and say his goodbye. And not run.  
  
And maybe that was the real gift Shuichi had given him, Yuki thought as he climbed the stairs to Shuichi's ward. The end of running.  
  
And long after Shuichi was gone, the memory of that single act of heroism, a thousand memories of the realest, dearest human affection, and a new strength lived on in Yuki.  
  
Until he realized he'd just written Yutaka another ending, and was still walking up the stairs. And that reality was about to intrude. This was the last time he'd see Shuichi, and then he could start running away from yet another facet of his past. "Damn it all to hell. Really, to HELL..." Then he was on Shuichi's floor, and unless a really good idea for stalling came to him, it was time to face the music.  
  
"Ahoy! Eiri!"  
  
He sighed, doubting she really should have yelled like that over a ward full of sick people. "Hi, Yori, what's this about?  
  
"Well, for one thing, would you believe your main squeeze here says I look like you?"  
  
A voice Yuki had never expected to hear again, albeit raspy from disuse and in definite need of coffee, protested. "You do! You and Yuki and Tatsuha should be a sitcom! Two colors AND two genders!"  
  
Yuki was at the bedside in about the time he figured it would have taken Ryuichi. He looked remarkably thin and small amid all the equipment and the bandages that still bedecked his face. He was pale, and his eyes were blurry and half crossed. But, he was definitely alive. "...Shu-chan?"  
  
Shuichi smiled back. "Yuki." He reached up weakly, as Yuki sank into the chair Yori had carefully abandoned and took the hand. For a moment, all he could do was press the wasted fingers to his lips.  
  
After a sustained, touching moment, Shuichi spoke again. "You're not mad at me, are you, Yuki?"  
  
Yuki repressed the urge to slap himself. Those were just the first words he deserved, really. "No. No, of course not. Why would I be?"  
  
"I can't... can't remember... But that's good." His eyes slid closed, and he let out a tiny, endearing snore.  
  
"Wow, he IS cute." Yori offered him a bag of chips, which he made no move to accept. Don't worry; I won't steal him from you. I've got one of my own. Besides, the look he just gave you says it'd be hard."  
  
Yuki looked at her with an odd combination of gratitude and accusation. "You had something to do with this."  
  
"Sort of." She shrugged. "I came to visit a friend of mine who's holed up in chemo again, and I figured I might as well stop by and see him. I figured I'd try something I read about, and just sort of leaned over and whispered your name. Didn't expect anything, but his eyes popped straight open and he asked for you. Weird, huh? Eh, I dunno. The doctor was all astounded, and is busily calling newspapers, his parents, and the local mystic Wiccans to dispense and beg for explanations. I ended up having to pretend to be a nurse and call the Shindous. Amusing. Anyway, they're ecstatic and I assume will be here shortly, he's miraculously not sustained any brain damage-Tatsuha suggested you can't break a window that's not in the pane when I called him- and he should be able to come back home in a few weeks. I'd get out of here if I were you. His Mom sounded a little hysterical, and last I heard the rest of Bad Luck is on the way. Oh, and Ryuichi and Noriko should be around. And Some girl named Ayaka, sounded vaguely familiar when that Hiro guy mentioned her. Anyhow, I'm all for lunch."  
  
~~~  
  
Mizuki blinked a few times at the manuscript she'd just finished reading. "Well, Yuki, I'm... Surprised."  
  
Yuki pretended nonchalance. "Just be careful looking for typos. I was under a lot of stress at some points while I was writing. You want anything to drink?"  
  
"No, thank you..." His editor put down the bundle of papers. "Look, Yuki, are you considering your audience?"  
  
"You mean the one that'll buy anything with my name on it whatever the contents?" He sat on the edge of the sofa. "I don't think more than half of them actually read the books."  
  
"You might be on to something..." Mizuki shook her head. "Yuki, you may want to think about..."  
  
"Toning it down? Trying something else?" He snorted. "I told the truth for once. I don't plan to go back on it."  
  
"Which suggests to me you're feverish." Mizuki grinned. "What I was going to say is, you might think about retiring."  
  
It was Yuki's turn to blink owlishly. "What?"  
  
"What I mean is, maybe Yuki Eiri should retire. Churn me off some more of your best drivel and we'll sell it as your last great work. Probably make enough for you to retire on, as long as you mess around with the stock market and your significant other keeps rolling in the cash. You continue writing as Uesagi Eiri, and I'll make sure it's published and marketed to a very different crowd, if you keep giving me stuff of this caliber."  
  
Eiri grinned. "Deal. I'll have you something entitled Tall, Dark, and Winsome by next week."  
  
"So I'll tell my boss you missed your deadline, you procrastinating hack."  
  
"I love deadlines. I love the whooshing sound they make as they go by." He glanced back towards his bedroom, where he thought he heard something stirring. "Either that cat Mika thought herself so clever for giving me learned to talk—whine, or my White Elephant is awake. See you later."  
  
She let herself out, and Yuki wandered into the room. Shuichi was sitting up on the bed, petting the gray kitten and looking otherworldly in perfection. "Morning, Yuki."  
  
"Actually, it's about fifteen o' clock." Yuki stretched out on the bed and ruffled Shuichi's hair. "Well, I wrote it the way you said."  
  
"Really?"  
  
"Yep. They lived happily ever after."  
  
the field of view excels the dimension of panorama a perfect mimesis that can only tremble a cheap touch whose reaction is to look for secrets you want to see them even if they are coldly obscene a sea of gushing pleasure that alters the colors of the rainbow that strikes into this world adding shadows to the fringed game Kiss shining, imitating loneliness Cutting into space with entwined regret Make me shining, fragments of my scattered heart A radiance that surpasses hope Kiss shining, we're kissing in my eyes Melting away even the flower petals in our way Kill me shining, changing into the most exciting colors That first shone in a vision Please don't cryin', imitating loneliness Cutting into space with entwined regret Make me shining, fragments of my scattered heart A radiance that surpasses hope Kiss shining, imitating loneliness Cutting into space with entwined regret Make me shining, fragments of my scattered heart A radiance that surpasses hope  
  
A/N: I should note that the little song about mushrooms Ryuichi came up with out of nowhere was written by a sugar-high friend of mine when I accused her of "easting those mushrooms again." Irene reminds me of Ryuichi sometimes, actually. Oh, and Yuki's comment about deadlines whooshing by is attributable to Douglas Adams, God of Science Fiction and Comedy.  
  
Well, anyway, there it is, the end. YAAAAAAAAAAY! Well, I hope everyone's happy. I did my best. 


End file.
